As a daily Spotify listener, this is music to my ears, literally. But what is really going on here? Well, Spotify music is the largest/ leader in streaming music but Apple's 3 year old music service, Apple Music, is set to take over that title. Erin Grifith, writer for Wired, writes, "Spotify has 157 million users around the world, 86 million of whom do not pay to use the service."Basically, Spotify is adding in a free tier to keep people listening. This free tier will include the following; personalized artist and song recommendations that begin when they sign up, on-demand listening to playlists, and a data saver. Erin Grifith later writes about the interview done with Gustav Söderström, Spotify’s chief R&D officer. She wrote that he, "said the service differs from Apple and other competitors because it is about serving all music fans. 'They’re going to do what they can for the 40 percent of the world on iOS and we’re going to do what we can for 100 percent of the world,'" So, how will this affect our day to day use of Spotify? Well, most listeners will not be affected because they will not sign of for this new service. Like me, I will not because while its nice to have of the new features, I don't really need them. Also I like many other people are happy with Spotify while others are happy with Apple Music, its what you prefer mainly. If you would like to read the full article, then click the button bellow.
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To be honest, I have no clue what cryptocurrency is and I don't really care to know, but I would like to know. That's really contradicting but lets do this! The article is called CRYPTOCURRENCY SCAMS ARE JUST STRAIGHT-UP TROLLING AT THIS POINT, by Louise Matsakis. First off, what is a cryptocurrency? Defined by Oxford Living Dictionary, a cryptocurrency is "A digital currency in which encryption techniques are used to regulate the generation of units of currency and verify the transfer of funds, operating independently of a central bank." SO basically this article is about how digital currency are "trolling" people to buy more.
When I first read the title, I was not very interested but I clicked on it anyways. As I read through it i was becoming more and more interested. The article goes on to explain how Facebook is banning cryptocurrencies from advertising on their site. Later it talks about how some of these cryptocurrency sites pop and then disappear by a week later, maybe even less. For example, "Prodeum...a Lithuanian cryptocurrency startup that appeared online Thursday. By Monday, it was gone." These cryptocurrency sites are causing more harm than good and I want to know why they were causing harm when they were meant to be here for something good. the article is an interesting read, the link is down below! The city of Long Beach, California has many problems to deal with, but get this, the rising sea-level is not the top priority. Actually, their biggest problem is the heat. Specifically, the rising temperature. Long Beach's Mayor, Robert Garcia, said the following, "The increase in temperature is the real concern right now. It’s top of our list." The new prediction for 2050 is that the temperature expected to increase between 2.3 and 2.7 degrees. City hall ahs come up with a plan to fight the heat and hopefully lower is for good becasue 100 degrees in May is way too hot for my liking. the city's plan is "to create more parks and plant 10,000 trees in low-income areas of town to combat the heat. One study carried out at a local elementary school, and another at an office complex, showed that tree shade could reduce temperatures by as much as 3 degrees."
This sounds like a good idea right, but there is another problem. Long Beach also has a water problem. Creating more green spaces creates more need for proper irrigation. The city has been on water use prohibitions are still in effect. Also the water is barely reused because of the little amount of it, "In an average year, the Long Beach Water Department (LBWD) obtains 40 percent of its water from imported sources and 53 percent from groundwater—which is also partially dependent upon imported sources for recharge. Recycled water accounts for just 7 percent of the city’s water supply." The city also coming up with designs on how to re-create the community to benefit the resident of Long Beach to cool them down with some cool designs (pun intended). If you would like to read the full article click the button below. This article is about the findings of a glow in space, how it was first thought to be fake, and how this year it was said, "...the center of our Milky Way produces much more gamma radiation than our models of known gamma-ray sources suggest, said Luigi Tibaldo, an astrophysicist at Stanford University..." The author of this article is Katia Moskvitch. It is coming around a decade after the glow was discovered. The article is directed towards the science community, specifically the space field. The purpose is to inform readers, space lovers, and other scientist about the glow and how it will affect the rest of us. Like I said before this article is here now to show us the affects of the glow and to inform us, not scare. I would say that the author is very light and almost cheery but not quite. She is very aware of the glow but shares it with us in a nicer tone than expected. Over all I love this article and how it explains the glow n space. If you would like to read it click bellow. This article intrigued me from the title alone. I have always liked engineering and seeing 5 toys that would help kids understand it made me very happy. After clicking on the article and seeing that it was five short bullets with one or two sentences each, I was very disappointed. With that being said of my initial reaction, lets get into this analysis. "1. XYZprinting da Vinci miniMakerYou don’t need to be a fab-lab rat to work this simple 3-D printer. Kids can design their own objects using free software or print a redesigned trinket. | $250 (Ages 14+)" This first bullet point is the very first one and corresponds with the picture(to the side). First of all a 3-D printer is A LOT of money, even the "kid-friendly" printer is a lot of money. "2. Kano Pixel Kit It’s no Retina display, but Kano’s 16x8-pixel grid still dazzles. Make the LEDs glow using Kano’s simple web coding app. Program the screen to display weather and stock data, or just create pixel art. | $80 (Ages 6+)" This is just silly, a six year old isn't going to know how to code. All they will think of the toy is pretty lights. Yes,the toy is partially for that, but it is mainly about web coding which kids wont know how to do. "3. CubettoThis nifty kit works like a physical command line. Each colorful plastic block represents an action; string multiple actions together on the board to make a program that the little mobile bot obeys. | $225 (Ages 3+)" This toy is a little less insane but not completely sane. For one, the price. No parent is going to buy there kid this simply because of the price. And two, i am almost positive that there is another toy out there for a cheap price that would work just as well. "4. Lego Boost Boost combines regular blocks with motors, lights, and sensors so kids can construct robots (like guitars and kitty cats) that come to life. It doesn’t work like magic, though. Making the bots move requires some basic programming, which Lego stealthily disguises as playtime using a fun, interactive mobile app. | $160 (Ages 7–12)" Just by the picture alone, I couldn't tell what it was, so i looked it up and found another, clearer, picture (shown below). Its looks like a small cat toy. Now what it does, I'm not totally sure. Even the description isn't very helpful and it would take a lot of time to construct, even the most basic item. "5. Tech Will Save Us Dough Universe Electrical engineering is hard ... unless it involves malleable play dough. Kids can build basic circuits out of the squishy stuff using this kit’s controllers and connectors. A dinosaur with flashing eyes? A piano that plays a tune when you touch it? Sure—and through it all, the dough still tastes the same. | $135 (Ages 4+)"
This another more reasonable one yet still insanely expensive. Its basically play dough with attachments. i think its a neat idea but not for $135. So I know that this article is to teach kids the basics of engineering but, a kid isn't going to know how to use the item properly and it is so much money for something they might break. I would love to get kids into engineering but not for this much money. I would also love for the article to have more detail about either the products or why she, the author, choose these five. Other than that, I enjoyed the article.
This article talks about how the emoji has evolved from when google brought it out a half decade ago to today's. Also, there is depicting of each emoji face and background. Emojis are more than you think.
The intended audience for this article is people who do not fully understand how to use emojis or how they work. It could also be people looking to get more involved with today's changing world. The article came pretty close to the Apple IOS update when new emojis were released. The purpose of this article is to explain why we are obsessed with using the tiny faces to show emotion rather than actually calling and talking to someone to hear the tone of their voice. The focus of the article, other than emojis, is to explain why we need these little faces for a form of communication rather than talking over the phone: “Emoji were no longer these cutesy, highly-branded things that everybody could go out and design in crazy ways. They'd become this really essential tool for communication.” (Gus Fonts, product manager for Android). When you think about it, almost everyone of your texts have the emojis in it. They have controlled our texting ways for a long time now and do not seem like it will stop. The use of emojis will not slow down and more and more new ones will come in the future. if you would like to read the full article click on the link below.
https://www.wired.com/story/google-emoji-redesign/
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